


Points of Connection

by Project0506



Series: Soft Wars [140]
Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars: The Clone Wars (2008) - All Media Types
Genre: Culture Differences, Family, Feelings, Gen, Healthy Adult Conversation, Sass, Star Wars AU - Soft Wars, brothers being brothers
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-14
Updated: 2021-02-14
Packaged: 2021-03-14 08:40:26
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 4,639
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29415774
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Project0506/pseuds/Project0506
Summary: A vod delicately handles Socializing.  His ori'vod judges and opines
Relationships: CT-6116 | Kix & Keeli
Series: Soft Wars [140]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1683775
Comments: 27
Kudos: 202





	1. When on Rhodia, do as the Rhodians

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Keeli prepares for Socializing. Kix judges and opines.

_ **Private Message** _

_**f** _ _**C*MrXu5LSJdNgM+2j** _ _:_ _You know I really didn’t think I would like you._

“Do you recall that agreement we made-”

“Not even remotely.”

“- where we wouldn’t judge any of each other’s life choices-”

“Doesn’t sound familiar.”

“- but especially the dubious ones. Those are my uppers.”

“No they’re not.”

They are.

Keeli discovers this with his head about a quarter of the way through a neck hole all stretched out from a massively oversized head and warped from massively oversized shoulders. Well hell. He supposes ‘decisiveness’ is technically a ‘leadership quality’, so if he’s gotten far enough to see daylight he might as well commit. He pulls it the rest of the way on and dutifully ignores the delicately mocking eyebrow raised in response.

“You look like a dormless vagrant.”

Kix, Keeli notes, doesn’t even have the decency to open his eyes first. Ass.

“It’s recent CC fashion.”

“Your _ osik _1 is coming out the wrong end.

“Is that the professional medical diagnosis?”

“Of course. I’ll be happy to book you an appointment to get that looked at.”

_Ass_.

Keeli makes the grand mistake of catching his own eye in the sliver of mirror his door has been granted. He looks like a professional idiot. Kark.

Kix snorts and if he wasn’t currently holding every single one of Keeli’s (multiple! How decadent these delicate CCs are! Or how delicate they think CTs…) pillows hostage, Keeli would smack him with one. He still might, if he decides it’s worth the bother trying to wrestle one from his twin first.

He shifts and his reflection flashes a scandalous hint of pale collarbone. Ugh. He has a jacket somewhere, he thinks, one of the many foisted off on him that he hasn’t yet regifted to Gus. He’ll have to suffer through the indignity of sporting some Company’s insignia on his back if he wants to button himself in. He drops to rustle under the bunk: if he’s right he’d kicked it back behind the extra DC-16A ammo he’s holding on to for when the brass makes good on their threat to discontinue the line.

“Life choices,” Kix mutters, “and our general agreement not to judge them.”

“What _I_ remember,” Keeli grunts and wriggles his shoulders past his grip modding kit, “is _someone_ unilaterally decreeing we wouldn’t judge each other and no one bothering to address your hypocrisy.”

“How coincidental,” intones Kix because he is quite content to ignore the bits he doesn’t like. “I’m _unilaterally_ rescinding that now.”

“Good for you. Chase your dream.” Is that it… no. What even _is_ that? Some sort of cloth bucket that covers your ears and leaves your face exposed? When did Keeli accumulate this much garbage? Gus will love it.

“Those are still my uppers. I’m literally looking at a burn hole from Geonosis.”

“Kark you kindly.”

“Oh classy Kil’ika, really.”

Found it. And of course it’s a Winder flight jacket, the snake-cog-wings sigil splashed gaudily all across the stretch of the shoulders. Honestly, these CCs don’t even have the subtlety of the average gelagrub. Keeli shrugs into it anyway and hopes viciously that he doesn’t run across Commander Doom: he doesn’t feel up to dealing with passive-aggressive judgment right now. If Commander Doom _wants something_ he needs armor up and ask. Keeli’s willing to accept commission from him; Commander Doom seems like a vod with actual processors under his bucket. Keeli’s still not going to make it easy on him, passive-aggressive or no.

“And somehow people still think you’re the sensible one.”

Correction, he doesn’t feel up to dealing with passive-aggressive judgment from _dual_ vectors right now.

“Please,” he grunts as he decides against shell boots or grays’ dress shoes and unearths a distressingly comfortable worn-in leatheris ankle-high pair that might be Rex’s. “Tell me how you really feel.”

“Why would I waste my wisdom? You’re planning to ignore me.”

“Of course. But the lecture might make you feel accomplished.”

“Kark you quite kindly.”

“Classy, Kix’ika.”

Kix snorts and Keeli is very aware that if he were an iota less comfortably cocooned in Keeli’s very own bunk, he’d be weaponizing Keeli’s very own pillows.

“A couple of tendays of ‘special Leadership training’ and you’ve gotten far too big for your blacks. I _am_ still older. Tubling.”

Keeli is as presentable as he’s going to get without breaking into the crate of donated, useless non-protective clothing he can’t even justify passing to Gus. Kix’s judgment _there_ would be bruising in its pointedness. He checks his reflection again.

He doesn’t look like a soldier.

He looks like. Well, he isn’t quite sure what he looks like, isn’t quite sure whether he likes it. Odd, at the very least. An appropriate description, given he’s swathed in CC contraband and CCs are themselves entirely odd.

“It’s strange.”

Their eyes meet in the mirror. Kix is assessing, but neither dismissive or truly disapproving. More curious, than anything. Funny, curiosity was always _Keeli’s_ vice.

“Bad?” Keeli prompts. He’s never bother pretending that Kix’s opinion means anything less than everything to him.

“Not bad. Just strange. I suppose _that_ is also current CC fashion.”

“Only the best.”

Kix snorts again, drops back into the next of blankets and pillows he’s built up around himself and snugs back against the wall. It’s all the surrender Keeli will get out of him, so he’ll take it. “Because CCs are a bizarre mutation we’re all pretending happened on purpose.”

“They’re occasionally amusing.”

“And you’re going to subject yourself to their idiocy on purpose.”

Keeli’s comm flashes the steady beat of incoming messages still unread. He smiles just a little, just a little rueful. Curiosity was always his vice. “Seems like it.”

_ **Private Message** _

_**Keeli**_ _ **:**_ _I’_ _m so gloriously humbled oh great commander, that you would bestow favor on little me_

Keeli hits send, and grins at the immediate pulsing marker of a message being typed.

Kix rolls his eyes so hard Keeli would swear he’d strain something. “Go on then. But don’t say I didn’t warn you.”

“I wouldn’t expect any less.”

“And don’t wake me up when you get back. I have two days planetside and I plan to spend every single moment asleep.”

“As your Chancellorship decrees.”

_ **Private Message** _

_**fC*MrXu5LSJdNgM+2j:**_ _You should be._

_ **Private Message** _

_**fC*MrXu5LSJdNgM+2j:**_ _I_ _am_ _pretty great._

_ **Private Message** _

_**fC*MrXu5LSJdNgM+2j:**_ _And I don’t like just anyone._

_ **Private Message** _

_**fC*MrXu5LSJdNgM+2j:**_ _P.S._ _I’d like you better if you brought me_ _snacks_ _._

Well. He’s already shed the armor, to cater to the oddities CC’s foment in their leisure. Clothes and food, he’s found, are how they make friends. He rustles through Kix’s most obvious med kit and grabs a packet of snacks tucked away in the usual corner. Predictable, his Kix’ika is.

“That’s Killik. Haven’t determined if that’s palatable to humanoids yet,” Kix warns from his cozy depths. “Probably won’t kill you but I haven’t found anyone fool enough to try it.”

“Fortunately,” Keeli smarms, “I have about ninety eight potential testers.” How convenient that ‘trying unknown foods’ is a long-standing CT bonding tradition, and Rex will definitely back him up on that.

Kix snickers. “ _Oya_!”

Oya indeed.

Keeli is armored up and armed. He marches forward to mingle.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> 1\. Shit. Back  
> 
> 
> Who is Keeli messaging: That will be answered someday probably.  
> Why is their screenname so weird: Because plot.  
> Why do you never have actual answers: That's a great point. _Confetti_  
>  Stay tuned for these and other burning questions, when the Adventure Continues ... Eventually!


	2. All Roads Lead to Rhodia

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Neyo avoids Socializing. Bacara judges and opines.

Twenty feet of mast. Maybe another five across the ground. Down is no problem, by his calculation he can clear that in two, two and a half seconds.

Three seconds. Round it.

Alpha-17 isn’t here to _whinge_ at him, preach on about _limits_ or prattle on about _restraint_ and _pushing_ _too_ _far_ and _taking_ _unacceptable risks_.

There’s a staccato burst of laughter from milling ARC candidates that, for just a second, washes over the staticky whine of someone’s sliced holoradio feed. The alcove they’ve clustered in is one well known for lack of cameras, shoddy oversight for something with one side spilling across a platform to the sea. Curved walls and a drop-front overhang buffet against most of the incessant rain, but ocean spray kicks everything up damp anyway. A cadet patrol drops by on their regular route. The CCs ply them with snacks, as customary. This little corner has never once been reported.

And yet any one of them would carry tales of Neyo right back to Alpha-17. Some, Neyo thinks with a considering glance, more likely than others.

They won’t mean it to get Neyo reprimanded. He has to remind himself of that a lot and it sometimes still doesn’t shade fully real. They won’t mean it to get Neyo reprimanded or to give themselves an opportunity to drag him down. Push themselves up a rank. Alpha-17 doesn’t do ‘ranks’. So they have nothing to gain from it. But they’ll think they’re doing it out of concern; they’ll think he can’t handle that much.

Three seconds down, to keep the nosey narcs off Neyo’s karking back. Then a second across ground. Easy. Getting back up one-handed will be a little trickier. Neyo could maybe hold the cup in his teeth? That would -

38 ( _Bacara,_ Bacara now and damn if the word doesn’t suit him) reaches out oh so terribly casually and scooches the cup an inch closer to himself.

Neyo hisses. Bacara is, like the ‘bulwark’ of his name, karking unmoved.

“If someone wants this dessert. Thing. In a cup,” he rumbles, “they can come down and have a conversation like an adult for it.”

As if Neyo wanted that stupid waste of calories anyway. He folds his arms and glowers. Bacara glowers right back. He’ll deny it, probably, but Neyo knows what a glower looks like on his stupid face.

Twenty feet of mast, five feet across the ground to that stupid dessert in a cup that Neyo doesn’t even want. Twenty feet of mast and five feet two inches to a conversation he doesn’t want to have.

Doesn’t _need_ to have! Bacara has some karking sense, or did once. He should be able to figure out Neyo’s trying to be _polite_ and _give him space_. It’s some karking character growth for him, in his opinion. And what does the little moron do with it? Does he go find his cute little CT sidearm, maybe make an idiot of himself twitching to the music like some of those other reg-trained CCs? No. No he does not. No instead he’s here, twenty feet down at the bottom of a twenty foot mast Neyo’s retreated up. With a stupid cup of goopy sugar Neyo doesn’t even want.

There’s a pop of a seal and a flimsifoil crackle of a lid pulled back. Bacara very pointedly places the now-opened package right back where it was. It looks karking disgusting. Neyo doesn’t want to try it.

“I’ve been told it’s best cold.”

Neyo has an even dozen possible responses to that. He’d first have to acknowledge it. That feels too much like losing.

The stand-off resumes.

There’s very narrow spire under his boots, and very narrow wires under his shebs. Neyo’s as sure-footed as he’d be on the ground regardless: he’s got leverage and he’s sure of his skills. He reclines on the rigging the mast anchors easy as if he was in his own bunk.

It’s actually unpleasantly cold up here. Neyo’s fine admitting that much, if only to himself. Blacks are thermoregulated, but civvies don’t seem to give a single aerial osik for actual utility in their clothes. For all these pants are thicker than blacks, they’re completely useless against the storm winds rolling in off the water. The jacket is little better. Neyo wishes he’d put his blacks on under it. He’d look like the others, like he’s leaning towards embracing that unnaturally casual bent they’ve all taken up, but under it he’d still have some familiar ground.

He’s maybe a little jealous of Bacara right now. Chestplate, backplate, pauldrons off, and that’s as much casual as the Marine’ll adopt. Looks warm.

Somewhere down over there in that uncoordinated knot, it smells like someone boils up some tea. With this lot, Neyo’d bet rations there’s hooch in it. Sounds good actually. Sounds better than dessert goop. Neyo sways a little as he thinks, isn’t even actually _planning_ to make a dash for it but Bacara reaches out to snag the dessert thing anyway. Loudly drag it another inch away from the post. Right shiny bastard.

Neyo glares. Bacara taps the cup on the durasteel floor, as if Neyo for a moment forgot it was there. Bastard.

“Okay…” a voice drawls. “This isn’t exactly what I was expecting.”

The other CCs, they’ve been all polite all night long. Food’s made its way to Neyo and Bacara both, there’s been a check or two that they’re both ‘still doing okay’, but otherwise they’ve all left Neyo to deal with this annoyance on his own. They won’t poke themselves in to it, not when everyone knows Bacara and Neyo have got history.

CT wouldn’t know that though. And CTs all seem to be real karking ballsy.

“Lieutenant,” Bacara starts. And stops. Neyo rolls his eyes. Figures _now_ he’d run out of words, when he’s just fine tormenting Neyo right up a mast.

“Hey. Hey CT. Hey, up here CT. Come here.”

“Do not,” Bacara growls like thunder rumbling in over the seas, and suddenly he’s found his words again. Point for Neyo, thanks. “Pay him _any_ attention.”

“Hey CT, I want you to do me a favor,” Neyo presses on regardless. “See that thing there. That cup that looks like a tooka with digestive issues crapped in it?”

Bacara picks the dessert cup up, tucks it firmly into his elbow. Bastard. As if Neyo even wanted that stupid thing.

“Can I help you Lieutenant?” Bacara asks and it’s almost kind. He’s like that now. Sure, he’s always been a bit, but he’s always been a lot better at hiding it. Neyo doesn’t know if its that new sidearm thing that’s bringing it out, or he’s adjusted to getting vode under his care. Neyo knows that feeling. He’s barely had his Valors for any time at all, but he’d murder for them. No questions asked.

Then again, maybe it’s just Bacara finally being out from under the JP’s thumb.

Neyo was always the luckier of them, of the two of them. Neyo always knew exactly what to expect from the trainers. Knew what emotions to close off, what to show. What marked success. Bacara always had to close off everything, never knew when expectations would change again. Neyo’s viciously glad Bacara now finally has the chance to figure out whatever it is he wants people to see when they look at him.

Even if right now he’s being a big dumb brute too duracrete-thick to accept the fucking favor Neyo’s trying to do him: staying out of the way so he can work whatever it is between him and his CT into fullness. Neyo’s not blind. That, what they’ve got? That isn’t casual. But Bacara is treating it like it can just be put aside whenever he wants.

He shouldn’t be here, now. He shouldn’t have left wherever Rex is. Neyo shouldn’t have to tell him that.

Maybe the JP excised Bacara’s ability to know what the kriff a good thing looks like. It would track.

“I don’t know, sir?”

Neyo can’t tell which of them looks more awkward, the CT vod’ika or Bacara himself. CT at least is much worse at hiding it. Kark, they don’t teach the CTs anything about protecting themselves, do they? Neyo’s Valors are just like that. Open. Too open. Neyo’s going to have a hell of it, keeping them all safe.

The CT throws more awkward stilted words at Bacara, who throws awkward confused words back. The CT doesn’t quite want to ask his question, and Bacara doesn’t know to answer.

This’d be prime entertainment if the cringe and discomfort didn’t make Neyo feel a nasty sort of thing in his gut. After all he actually likes the CT. Didn’t expect to: figured with his Valors and Bacara he’d have been full up of people to like. But the vod’ika is sassy. A great shot. Decent slicer too, if he was able to track the comm signal here from just a couple of messages.

And Neyo does like Bacara, usually. When he’s not an idiot.

“Up here CT,” Neyo calls again. “Those messages were from me.” He waves. “Are those my snacks?”

“You.” The CT says, not asks. He checks his display and Neyo’s got a good idea what it’ll show. The CT waves it around. Whatever tracker he’s built beeps companionably every time it waves past Bacara. CT’s tracker isn’t wrong: it accurately traced the signal directly to the source. Bacara’s wrist comm.

Bacara gets it first. “Neyo _did you slice my comm_?”

“No,” Neyo answers perfectly honestly. He cloned it. Different. “CT, toss that up here. Is it sweet?”

“It’s Killik,” the CT says and his confusion remains but the awkwardness is starting to flee. Hard to keep it up, when The Marine is pouting like a tubie.

“I don’t know what that means,” Neyo admits.

“No one does. So far no one’s been dumb enough to try it.”

Sounds like a challenge.

“Neyo!” Bacara’s annoyance takes him all the way up to his feet. “What did you do to my comm?”

“Not a thing.” Slightly more of a lie, but not _too_ much of one. “CT, toss it. I know you have good aim.”

“Do not give him anything. Neyo stop bullying the CTs.”

“I am _not_.”

The CT immediately tattles, grin restrained but present and devious. “Sorry Commander Bacara, I have to give Commander Neyo this so he’ll like me better.” Neyo definitely likes this one. He wonders how pissy Doom would be, if he tried to snag him. Jet’s been sniffing around but no one knows if he’s actually serious or just trying to stir up trouble.

“ _Neyo_.”

“I should change my name. Something harder to pronounce.”

Bacara growls, frustrated. “What are you playing at?”

There’s a shift.

Neyo’s gotten better at recognizing it. He’s had to, he _has_ to. He has his Valors now and they’re all of them his to care for. He’s been told to come back for more, when he’s _brokendamageddestroyed_ the ones he has and it is at least a little sheer _spite_ that drives him to protect every one of them. His own.

Neyo recognizes the shift in himself, the tease washed-away-drowned under boiling anger. He knows the signs of true, molten rage sparking through his veins. (Playing? Is it _Neyo_ that’s playing games?) “Oh?” he asks and his throat swallows around venom he wants to spit. “Is _that_ the question here?”

Bacara drops a hand on the CT’s shoulder. Good. Good. Neyo swallows. Bacara has always been Neyo’s equal. CTs … little brothers should be protected.

“Because from my view, the important one is less ‘oh woe is me my karking comm codes were sliced by some miscreant’. And more why the kark someone would go through the trouble of setting up emergency contact codes and list _the wrong CT_.”

Bacara has found something. Something good. Something trainers haven’t twisted, haven’t dangled in front of him, can’t snatch away just because. Bacara has found someone he wants to be gentle for, who can nearly keep up with him. Bacara has found a _good thing_ and it feels to Neyo like every move he makes screams he doesn’t recognize it.

He follows Neyo, when Neyo leaves to give them time alone.

He doesn’t have Rex’s codes in his comm.

It feels careless, like he’ll throw this away. Lose it. Without knowing how important it is. Neyo can’t let him.

“No offense,” Neyo says to the CT and he tries, his best, to be genuine. “I really do like you.”

“You thought I was Rex.”

“For about a half a sentence. Other CT fakes polite too much. You though, you speak my language.”

“Neyo-” Bacara starts. Neyo ignores him.

“Was just surprised, is all. Only one contact and well. You’d figure.”

Two, two contacts. But the other is Neyo himself and it doesn’t count.

“They’re emergency contacts,” Bacara says and it’s as gentle as if he’s talking to a CT. “For if something goes wrong. And Lt Keeli is Rex’s or’tat.”

The CT chuckles, nervous. Neyo swears those two are playing them all with this age banthashit, but he’s nice enough not to call them on it.

“Your sidearm should be contact one. Idiot.”

“Contact one is you. Because if there’s an emergency, someone needs to call you.”

“ _Idiot_.”

“And contact two is Lt Keeli, if there’s an emergency and Rex is with me.”

The worst part, Neyo thinks, the very worst part is how logical Bacara always makes things seem. How quick he can prod holes through the foundations of Neyo’s anger and how little superior he ever looks while doing it. It isn’t the upper hand Bacara’s after. Neyo doesn’t know _what_ it is he’s after -

(That’s a lie. Bacara has never wanted anything other than to stand next to Neyo, on even ground.)

\- but he settles in in his way, comfortable stance for as long a wait as he needs. Neyo bites down on a grit of teeth and his anger drains even without his permission. It goes as fast as it had spiked and it leaves freezing empty nothing in its place. Neyo’s always hated that the worst, that feeling of vast futility that always follows right after the rage leaves.

Bacara nods, as if he can see it. Who knows, maybe he can.

“Apologies, Lieutenant, but can you excuse us?”

“Apparently,” the CT sighs and Neyo can’t help feel some guilt for the furrow between his brows. Neyo had invited him to that party thing still stubbornly going on in the alcove, not to the middle of whatever this is. He shouldn’t have had to be dropped into this mess. Neyo will have to make it up to him, somehow. He seems to like civvie clothes.

“You two,” the CT continues with the tone of a little brother trying to pretend they’re not, “need to try talking _to_ each other. Instead of past each other. I’m told it helps. _I_ am going to take _this_.” And the CT takes the goopy dessert without an ounce of shame. Neyo likes him. “You can have the bug snacks. And sort things out. And you.” Lieutenant Keeli wields the most judgmental of eyebrows up at him “When you’re quite finished having a domestic, we can discuss potential friendship.”

Neyo giggles. “If Doom drags his feet any longer,” he says very, very seriously, “I’ve got a spot.”

The CT raises the other eyebrow up at him, and there’s a smile lingering under the annoyance. “I’d kill you within a tenday. Sir.” Neyo really likes him.

They watch him amble back over to the party, watch someone find him food and, Neyo’s very sure, check that he’s unscathed from his brush with them. They’re both of them are using it as an excuse to delay. Finally, Bacara sighs.

It’s funny, he’s known for never surrendering. Neyo wonders what it is about him that makes Bacara decide sometimes it’s far too much work to persist.

“Come down.”

“I’m just fine right here, thanks.”

“Neyo.”

He sounds tired. They all are. Even the partiers over yon are sluggish and lethargic under their revelry - Alpha-17 knows how to run a good workout, keep them going right up til the burn just barely starts. But more, Bacara also sounds patient, like he’ll stand there and wait until the heat death of the universe, if he needs to. The storm out in the distance rumbles closer and wind picks more insistently at Neyo’s hair.

Neyo goes down. He takes his time. Four seconds.

They stand, face to face, the silence strangely fraught. Bacara offers him the bag of Killik snacks. It’s an odd sort of bitter-salty-sweet.

“Stop being an idiot,” Bacara orders, full hypocrite.

No you, Neyo wants to say but the snacks are also weirdly sticky In his teeth.

“I will see Rex tomorrow. _Today_ you and I are are going to.”

He stops and searches for words. Neyo rolls his eyes, thumps hard at his shoulder. Distracts him from the frustration that always follows when the Galactic Standard he has proves inferior to the thoughts he wants to express. “Don’t hurt yourself.”

“Socialize,” Bacara decides, though it’s clear the word doesn’t fit quite right.

“What did I _just_ say?”

This time it’s Bacara that rolls his eyes. Neyo does so like prompting that reaction. But he sobers quickly, and Neyo can’t help but follow suit. Bacara was always the worst kind of influence on him.

“Don’t leave me behind,” Bacara says, orders, intent. It hits like a body blow.

There are worlds of words Neyo could scrape up to say to that. ‘How can I?’ ‘I wouldn’t.’ ‘It’s you who will-’. ‘You _should_.’

He doesn’t say any of them. They’d be wasted. The Marine came stubborn.

“Neyo.”

Neyo thrusts the bag of snacks at his chest. “Have one. They’re rancid.”

Neyo’s good, very good, at covering those moments when Bacara loses words. Bacara is better at covering Neyo’s. “Do what you want,” Bacara offers instead. “But know that if you go away, I will follow.”

Neyo shoves the bag hard at his chest. He glares hard just to the left of Bacara’s ear. He won’t meet Bacara’s eyes, the sincere conviction in them will just make him angry. He doesn’t respond. Bacara has made it so he doesn’t have to.

The Marine takes a snack. Chews it and contemplates. “This is vile,” he accuses.

Neyo bristles. It’s all play. It is easier ground for them, the back and forth, the needling. Or, it’s easier ground for Neyo. He supposes that’s why Bacara tries to prod at that most often.

Neyo doesn’t know what to do with that resolute honesty, besides ignore it and carry on.

“I _just_ said-”

“Fix my comm.”

Neyo is back in Bacara’s space. He doesn’t know when that happened, when he moved. But he’s jabbed his elbow rough against Bacara’s ribs and grabbed hold of Bacara’s wrist comm as if nothing has changed, or will.

When their eyes meet, Bacara is only a little bit smug. I will follow you, he says, so it really isn’t worth the effort trying to hide. Neyo yanks his wrist just a little more harshly, in protest. He feels splotchy heat tint his cheeks as that smugness only grows. One unimportant, barely vestigial point for Bacara. Neyo glares and buries himself in the programming.

“I didn’t do anything to your comm.”

Bacara glares or he thinks he does. Neyo knows it’s a pout. The other ARC candidates give their cluster respectful distance.

“Unslice it.”

‘Unslice’. This pleb. “I didn’t slice it in the first place. Your karking password is ‘Bacara’.”

The aggravated offense is beautiful. “It is not.”

“It is,” Neyo jibes, gleeful. He flicks through menus with practiced familiarity, even if he can’t read the language set as default. “Your _username_ is a perfectly complex garble no one can be expected to remember. And your password is ‘Bacara’.” And with that it was all of nothing to set up a two-way relay for all messages between their comms. Function’s built right in. His grin is wide enough his cheeks hurt.

Bacara pouts.

Bruised dignity? Even better than offense. And kark it all, Neyo’s gonna _have_ to stick around isn’t he? Can’t expect a CT to be enough to keep this moron out of trouble.

“I’ll fix it for you. For a favor later.”

“I have a veto,” Bacara negotiates as if he’s got any leverage.

“You’re not that adorable.”

Neyo fixes the comm. They keep eating the snacks til they’re gone.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Look at that! Timely revelations! Man I hope folks are excited about this sort of thing happening because like Halley's Comet it's gonna flash right by and then not happen again for about 1 lifetime. _confetti_


End file.
